


if all we have is words

by withoutwords



Category: Hit the Floor (TV)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Sex, follows an existing story line, overuse of commas and similes, so it may be hard to follow if you don't know the canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-18
Updated: 2016-06-18
Packaged: 2018-07-15 19:38:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7235848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withoutwords/pseuds/withoutwords
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zero envisioned love like a gut punch. Quick and dirty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	if all we have is words

**Author's Note:**

> For [falafels7](http://archiveofourown.org/users/falafels7/pseuds/falafels7), whose love for Zude and prompts for fic inspired this completely.

  
_I’d never be here in L.A, with the world at my feet, if it wasn’t for you._  
[Zero, S2E08].  


At first, Zero thought Jude was a bit of a joke. He’d felt insulted that the best the _Devils_ could do was send some straight laced, stammering rookie who didn’t know his ass from his elbow. Zero wasn’t minor league – he had a _ring_ , for God’s sake – and if Oscar was putting up that sort of money to bring him to LA, well. The least he could do was front.

Except Jude sat Zero down with his favourite beer, loosened his tie and smirked. He said,

“You don’t want management here,” without missing a beat, without giving Zero space to think about what he _did_ want. He had a feeling Jude knew exactly what that was, and how to get it.

Zero liked it more than he should.

“Oh, I don’t?”

“Trust me.” It was like a switch had flipped, like the moment Jude had undone that top button he’d caught fire. “They’d all swill some whiskey and spout some clichés but I’m not here to play games, Zero. We both know you’re coming back to L.A with me.”

Zero hadn’t held back his huffing laugh, tipping his bottle at Jude. The guy was young, with stupid hair and ruddy cheeks and if Zero thought too hard about what that meant, about noticing it, he wasn’t going to let it show.

“I’m listening.”

  
_I’d never leave you._  
[Jude, S2E08]  


Zero’s hot with _Devils_ fever. It’s infectious. The flash of lights and the slide of sneakers and the beautiful woman with that spark in her eye that says, _this’ll be so good, or so very, very bad_. L.A was everything he’d wanted it to be, and everything he was owed.

Except L.A, mostly, was Jude.

Jude with a promo spot, or a car, or a beer. Jude at his back, at his side, or at his heels; making him chase faster, fight harder, be his best. Jude as _Team Zero_ , the only team he’s ever had, and it’s not until the words come out of Zero’s mouth, the,

“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” that he knows it’s the truth.

The last time he relied on someone, or trusted anyone, he’d been five years old and orphaned. He’d been sitting on a curb with a plastic bag full of clothes and a basketball rough beneath his hands. He’d been watching his Mom’s old Buick drive away, the one with the broken taillight, and wondering what time she’d be back.

He’d been lost. Alone.

Zero can say “You’re barking up the wrong tree,” because it’s simple, and it’s real. You have friends or you have sex and Jude’s only ever had sex. He can say, _be gay_ , or _oil me up_ , or, _have fun_ , because it’s what he’s been doing since his old team gave him a jersey and a household name: pretending. He can say, _sorry_ , and, _no_ , and huff and laugh because it’s easy. 

Easy right up until Jude goes to walk out the door and into another man’s arms. 

He can say, “You don’t even know the guy,” and he can kiss Jude, and so he does - but it’s not easy. It’s the most complicated thing he’s ever done.

“Shit,” Jude tells him, as Zero pushes him onto the bed, his eyes full of things Zero doesn’t want to see. “I’ve wanted this, wanted you.”

(Zero doesn’t know what he wants, but he knows he doesn’t want to share.)

  
_It’s not deep… I don’t make it deep._  
[Zero, S2E09.]  


Zero’s had a lot of sex. Sex with women, and men, sex with both – arrogant people and crazy people and people who did sex like there was a training manual (step one, step two, step-). Sex was bodies, and bodies he knew, and he was good at it, good at getting bodies to do what they were made for. Good at pleasure.

Jude – Jude’s new. New, but eager.

“Fuck me,” he tells Zero, not even a few weeks in, naked and flushed and arching his back, groaning from low in his throat. Zero’s okay where he is, nuzzling at the trail of belly hair leading down, mouthing at the head of Jude’s cock. Warm, pink, hard, wet, desperate for it, for _Zero_.

“Like – for real?”

Jude lets out an amused breath, and Zero knows how stupid that sounds. This is the realest thing he’s ever felt. “Yeah. Fuck me.”

It’s been messy. It’s been awkward hand jobs against the wall, and Zero trying not to thrust into Jude’s ardent mouth. It’s been bite marks and bruises and the time Zero had almost passed out – they’d rolled off the sofa and he’d hit his head on the coffee table. It’s been messy, but fuelled, loud and frantic; Jude’s not afraid to assert himself, not afraid to tell Zero how it feels.

It always feels amazing.

“Okay?” he asks, later, when he has two fingers curled inside. Jude’s dick starts to wane and his lips thin out and Zero slows, scissors gently. Jude let’s out a tiny, panting breath, nodding, muttering,

“Yeah, yeah, it’s just…”

“Weird, I know. Just relax, Jude,” Zero says, kissing at his hip, his belly. “Relax, I’ve got you.”

Zero’s slow going in, and filling him up, slow setting a pace so that he doesn’t embarrass himself. It’s good at his skin, and just beneath, at his blood and muscles, dizzying. But it’s good a lot deeper, to his bones. Good like coming in from the cold.

“Fuck,” Jude groans into the mattress, and it’s enough to spur Zero on, faster, harder. “Fuck, yes, yeah, please,” and it’s just a jumble of words, and sounds, a jumble of feelings that Zero doesn’t know what to do with. 

Zero fucks, they fuck, but it sounds so crude now.

He pulls Jude closer and breathes.

  
_Unless you have something new to offer, leave me alone._  
[Jude, S3E04.]  


Zero envisioned love like a gut punch. Quick and dirty. He didn’t know it could work so slowly, that he could be clinging to something so tightly and only realise he was doing it when he started to lose his grip.

That was Jude. Before him, everything was clutter, everything was expendable, and Zero kept throwing things out and throwing them out until all he had left was the one thing that mattered.

“I love you, stupid,” tore out of Zero, a shot for goal in the dying seconds. 

It was more than he’d given anyone, but it still wasn’t enough.

If he was a better man, he’d tell Jude he likes the way his hair curls in the morning. He’d tell him he likes his dry wit and his braying laugh and how his tongue pokes out the corner of his mouth when he concentrates. He’d tell him he likes the way he toes the line of deceit but would lay down his life for the people he loves.

He’d tell him he’s _it_ , and anybody else will pale in comparison.

Except he doesn’t.

When Jude says, “I love you, too,” he sounds disappointed.

He sounds like he’s drifting away.

  
_I liked it when it was just us._  
[Zero, S3E10.]  


At the heart of all things – Zero’s success, and his fortune, and the ring on his finger – there’s playing ball. He’s got the past buried so deep even he struggles to remember details, but basketball’s always been different. The red string.

(Zero was ten when one of the foster kids, Mako, told him that story.

“You have a string, and she has a string, and one day the string pulls together.”)

Basketball had been Zero’s fate, his anchor. It pulled at him, pulled him away, away from the yelling and the hurting and the echo of the slamming doors. Away from the hissing voices, the, _you’re nothing, you’re zero, you don’t count_.

Zero remembers the hours he spent at the park down the road, like muscle memory, it still aches. He remembers the creak of the gate in the morning, again late at night when he’d return. He remembers the time he got caught and how he couldn’t throw a ball for weeks after that, but he remembers it didn’t matter.

He wanted fame and fortune, he wanted to be someone – but he only wanted to do it on the court.

“I still can’t believe you did that,” Jude says, softly, curled up under the shelter of the bed sheets. “Kissing me in front of all those people, I…” 

“I didn’t think,” Zero tells him, honestly, because he’s never lied to Jude before. He’s not doing it now. “I just – I saw you there and I couldn’t – I didn’t - ”

“It’s like the red string of fate,” Jude says and it makes Zero’s whole body seize. “It’s this fairy tale my mom told me when I was a kid, about being tied to someone forever, like…”

“Destiny.”

“Yeah. You know it?”

“Yeah. I always thought mine was basketball.”

Jude laughs so loud Zero can feel his belly shake, and Zero’s not sure why he’s smiling but he is. He can’t stop. “Or maybe basketball is the string. You know? Tying us together.”

Zero feels that in his throat. He presses closer. “I like that.”

  
_You’re … the only person who makes me feel normal._  
[Jude, S3E03.]  


Zero’s never been a nice guy, not unless it suits him. It took a long time to forgive the world; for losing his family, losing purpose, losing touch. When he finally started to make it, when people finally started to notice, it only seemed fair to take it all back. To play the good, God-fearing boy they put on the magazines, but really be the sinner they’d rather hide behind the curtain.

He’d been deluded by his victories, for a while. 

“I want pancakes,” Jude says from across the table. They’ve got seats outside the restaurant, a shaded spot, and with his back turned in Zero can mostly pretend people aren’t looking. “Or maybe waffles. With the fruit on the side, definitely, and a latte, skim.”

“I could also get you a lobster plate,” Zero teases, “One of those bibs?”

“That can be our dinner date,” Jude says, pulling a face behind his sunglasses. There's a spot on the collar of his tee, toothpaste maybe, and his hair's still fluffy from sleep. He's pale in the sun, lounged low in his seat, and he looks perfect.

He looks like all of Zero’s victories in one.

“Let me guess, you’re having Froot Loops,” Jude says around a laugh, and Zero throws a menu at him.

“Actually, I was thinking I’d get pancakes and waffles and we can share. But if you want to me a smartass maybe I’ll - ”

“No, no, no, I take it back, no Froot Loops.” 

Jude leans over enough to give Zero a soft kiss, quick and sweet, like a _thank you for letting me have what I want_. Zero snakes out a hand, to pull him back in, and kiss him a little more insistent, open his mouth.

It’s, _thank you for making me better_.

  
_That’s my name. Gideon._  
[Zero, S2E12]  
  


Jude brought him to L.A to have everything.

Everything turned out to be Jude.

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr.](http://thefancyspin.tumblr.com)


End file.
